All the images in this collage were taken at a very lovely party for a friend who turned eighty-five. It was a Sunday and everyone was in their Sunday best and more. I was fascinated with the beautiful pieces of jewelry that were worn by the women for extra adornment on this special occasion. These images are of women all over the age of seventy.
There were fascinating stories and history behind some of these pieces and that is what made this time so special. We were all seated at the same table and I had been admiring how personable and beautiful these women were. They were very pleased to tell me some of the stories and were flattered that I wanted to take photos of their jewelry.
The ring with the small ruby stone was an engagement ring that had been passed on to a daughter by her mother. She also wore a huge sapphire stone that had an unusual setting. She told me the story of how this ring had got lost and how she found it after seventeen years of looking for it – on the hand of a woman in a line at a bank, in Toronto. I was privy to the tale of how she got it back. Many pieces of jewelry that are worn by older women have great sentimental value as they were given to them by someone special. That ring had been a gift to her by her husband.
As women, we never lose our flair for dressing-up, fixing our face, hair, and nails – and beautifying ourselves with elegant pieces of jewelry. Our cave ancestors used bones, wood, seeds, and whatever they could find, to embellish themselves. We are using gold, silver, precious stones, and costume jewelry, to add style and flair to our own unique style of dressing. There is no age for a woman to stop wanting to make herself look good.
As an older woman myself, I often wonder if I’m too old to wear certain items of clothing, shoes, hair style, make-up, and jewelry, and whether I’m too old to do certain things as well. I’m sure other women feel the same way too. We’re never sure what is appropriate for our age.
I realize that it’s really about the way we feel inside. I myself was dressed up for this 85th Birthday Celebration and wore nice clothing, make-up, and jewelry. Our friend is a youthful eighty-five year old who is a literal “party animal.” She takes acting courses, plays ping-pong, dances, exercises, and is a beautiful blonde. We all dressed for her special occasion to make her happy and to make ourselves happy and feel good about ourselves. We weren’t feeling our age. It didn’t matter. I remembered reading this Samuel Ullman poem many years ago and it came to mind as expressing appropriate sentiments for this particular post. Hope you enjoy the collage too!
Youth is not a time of life; it is a state of mind; it is not a matter of rosy cheeks, red lips and supple knees; it is a matter of the will, a quality of the imagination, a vigor of the emotions; it is the freshness of the deep springs of life.
Youth means a temperamental predominance of courage over timidity of the appetite, for adventure over the love of ease. This often exists in a man of sixty more than a boy of twenty. Nobody grows old merely by a number of years. We grow old by deserting our ideals.
Years may wrinkle the skin, but to give up enthusiasm wrinkles the soul. Worry, fear, self-distrust bows the heart and turns the spirit back to dust.
Whether sixty or sixteen, there is in every human being’s heart the lure of wonder, the unfailing child-like appetite of what’s next, and the joy of the game of living. In the center of your heart and my heart there is a wireless station; so long as it receives messages of beauty, hope, cheer, courage and power from men and from the infinite, so long are you young.
When the aerials are down, and your spirit is covered with snows of cynicism and the ice of pessimism, then you are grown old, even at twenty, but as long as your aerials are up, to catch the waves of optimism, there is hope you may die young at eighty.
“Youth” – Samuel Ullman